Seòmar agus comataidhean

Can I have the time back?

I will take one more intervention.

That is a good question, and I think that the issue was raised in the House of Commons at lunch time today. I believe that some important detail will be forthcoming on that point. The member is quite right to say that the issue affects quite a lot of constituents.

It was also good to hear at lunch time much more about the direction of travel for the new Truss Government when it comes to additional support. In particular, I want to welcome the acknowledgement that what is happening now is on the scale of the pandemic. Most of the economic analysts this morning are predicting a package of upwards of £150 billion of support—that is above the level of support for the Covid pandemic and it would also represent the largest welfare bailout in recent history. Likewise, Liz Truss has indicated that an energy price cap is likely to be put in place at around £2,500 instead of the predicted £3,500.

I hope that those measures will persuade the First Minister that the UK Government is taking this matter extremely seriously. I hope, too, that she will respond accordingly to that commitment, and to the assurances from the new chancellor that there is a need for a large package of support now rather than a package of support that is made available through several incremental changes over time. I think that that will give a little bit of help and much needed relief in the short term.

I hope that the First Minister will also acknowledge and support the assurances that were made by the Prime Minister in her first public statement that this large package of short-term support will be accompanied by policies to address the longer-term imbalances in energy markets. That is important because, as Governments set about tackling this awful crisis not just in this country but in others, too, it is important to pay attention to the most recent economic analysis, and most especially to the factors that are affecting the supply and cost side of the economy, and then those that are affecting the demand side, because tackling each requires slightly different policy approaches.

The on-going war in Russia—especially the action of Vladimir Putin regarding the Nord Stream 1 gas pipeline—is, as everyone agrees, the root of the trouble for the supply chains and the basic costs of production.

With tomorrow’s announcement from the UK Government, there is the possibility that the Scottish Government will receive additional funding as a result of the tax cuts down south. Can the Deputy First Minister confirm that the Scottish Government would use that money, should it arise, to fund tax cuts for hard-working Scots to avoid us being the highest-taxed part of the UK?

I will take it if I can get the time back.

Yesterday’s programme for government debate set out the extent of this Parliament’s concern about the cost of living challenge that faces both of Scotland’s Governments, not just in terms of addressing the significant economic problems that we are all grappling with as a result of rampant inflation but, just as important, in terms of the resulting social and personal cost in our communities. It is good to hear what the minister has just said about the advice service that will be provided in that regard.

The editorial in Saturday’s Financial Times could hardly have been more blunt in its economic analysis of the fragility of the economy, which was that many businesses and members of the public are on the brink, and there is little optimism that the current situation will be short lived. It said:

“A failure to directly support at least the most vulnerable households and enterprises would be catastrophic for the economy”,

and it acknowledged that the effort that is required is on the scale of that which was required to tackle the pandemic.

It has been clear for some weeks that the £37 billion package of support that was announced some months ago by the UK Government, including the £400 payments that will start for households in October and the additional support with winter fuel and disability payments, is not enough, and it is certainly not enough to help those who are most in need.

Thank you, Presiding Officer.

There is no doubt that this has been a particularly difficult summer, during which it has not been easy to find any good news. The Westminster and Scottish Governments have not had their troubles to seek, and it is painfully obvious to all members that the public want their Governments to be fully focused—laser-like, as Jackie Baillie has just said—on the major challenges that we all face, and that they want both Governments to talk to each other, to co-operate and to set aside the constant bickering that does nothing to assuage their concerns about the future.

Yesterday, a constituent said to me that she did not believe that the Scottish public care terribly much about who sorts their energy bills, who picks up their bins, who is responsible for the transport that gets them to work or who sorts the deeply damaging strikes that have become too familiar across the country; they just want to get the issues sorted so that they can get on with their lives.

The First Minister is absolutely right to say that Westminster has a big role to play: it does, but so, too, does the Scottish Government, and it is important that those roles complement rather than contradict each other.

There has been consensus in the debate that it is the economy that matters most; it cannot be any other way in a time of crisis. I will concentrate on the economy, starting with this week’s stark economic analysis of where we are in terms of the Scottish Fiscal Commission’s forecasts. The SFC is a body that rightly earns considerable respect from John Swinney, who perhaps knows better than any of us about the true numbers that his department sees and, therefore, the extent of the economic problems that Scotland faces.

Professor Graeme Roy said again to the Finance and Public Administration Committee this morning that although many countries in the world face significant economic challenges, Scotland’s are particularly acute. That is pretty clear from almost every aspect of the analysis.

For many months, the Scottish Fiscal Commission has been highlighting the issue of weak productivity, which is, as Daniel Johnson highlighted in his speech and as I would argue, the main long-term problem in the economy. It is true that that is also a problem in the UK economy, but it is worse in Scotland and is putting untold pressures on gross domestic product and on our potential for economic growth. That, combined with the demographic issues that mean that the population of Scotland is likely to fall by 16 per cent in the next 50 years and an emphasis on the problems caused by a shrinking working population, suggests very difficult circumstances for us all.

The long and short of it is that much more must be done to ensure that Scotland is a much more attractive place in which to live and work. That is the strong message that is coming from business and industry. We need tax incentives, investment incentives and innovation and skills incentives. If we do not have those in place, our other endeavours to ensure that society functions well will not work and our wellbeing will not be enhanced.

So far, so good. We also need a sense of realpolitik about exactly where we are. The obituaries that followed the death last week of Mikhail Gorbachev, who was a giant of European and world history, reminded us that he not only understood, with perestroika, the need to place the economy at the heart of politics, but that he also understood, through glasnost, the importance of democracy and that, in addition to adherence to the principles that we all treasure, Governments must accept and respond to criticism.

There is a lesson here. Over the summer, the divisions within Scottish politics—and, yes, within my own party—have been stark. What alarms me, as a relative veteran—

I am finishing.

Today’s statement and debate have shown just how much there is to do. Westminster has important responsibility, but so, too, does this Parliament. Governments need to get on with the jobs that they were elected to do without any distractions or eyes off the ball. In my view, the public deserve nothing less.

I will, in a minute.

What alarms me, as a relative veteran in this Parliament, are the negativity and occasional vindictiveness that are now pervasive. Their promulgation and the response to them too often define the future of our politics.

Notwithstanding that point, the population change is not as severe in the rest of the UK as it is in Scotland. There were also issues prior to Brexit. Does Mr Swinney accept the argument that is made by a lot of economists and, to some extent, politicians that, at the moment, Scotland is not a sufficiently attractive place in which to work and live?